One Fall 06.11.11: Chapter 12

Thanks also to those of you who suggested or wrote alternate endings to Joey and Jade’s date. My favorite was this one by Guest2814:

Joey strolled back to his car, feeling smooth as a ribbon, and sniffed the hell out of the car seat.

Here are the obligatory links in case you need to do some catching up:

Chapter 1 – Joey Mayhem makes his TV debut.
Chapter 2 – Max Zeffer wants Joey wrestling for his own promotion
Chapter 3 – Web columnist Steve Garcia declares Joey Mayhem the first interesting thing to happen in the GWA in months. Just in time too, as the Family Television Group has named GWA Burn its Enemy #1.
Chapter 4 – Veteran women’s wrestler and resident hottie Jade Sleek tells Joey to watch his back right before GWA President Duke Corelli calls Joey into a meeting where he outlines a storyline that ends with Joey winning the World Heavyweight Championship.
Chapter 5 – The meteoric rise of James “Lucifer” Duvall.
Chapters 6 & 7 – A main event veteran goes down with an injury; Joey goes to dinner with Jade and Shane Walker, wrestling icons both, but only Joey is asked for an autograph.
Chapter 8 – A tournament on GWA Burn leaves Joey as the number one contender for the World Title belt.
Chapters 9, 10 & 11 – Steve Garcia declares war on the Family Television Group and promises a list of its biggest financial backers in a future column. Joey gets Jade to go out with him, and finishes their date in one of the many fashions suggested by the commenters at 411.

And now….

CHAPTER 12

A phone was ringing.

Joey rolled over. He had been dreaming about a Koala bear with peanut butter in its naval whose head exploded when the phone rang.

He picked up the phone.

“Hello?”

“Good morning Joey, it’s Fran Wallace. I’m so sorry to wake you.”

“Good morning,” said Joey. Fran Wallace? Where was he? It was dark, and cold.

“Listen Joey, Duke has asked me to get you to Houston today for some publicity work for Monday’s show. I’ve booked a flight for you at nine-thirty.”

“Okay.” Joey had figured out he was in a hotel room.

“I’ll have a cab for you in the lobby in an hour. Do you think you can be packed, checked out, and ready to go at six thirty?”

“Yeah, um…just a second please.” Joey sat up in bed, put the phone down on the night stand, and rubbed his eyes. He looked at the digital clock next to the phone. 5:31. What day was it? He flipped through the wrestling matches in his memory and tried to put them in order. He had wrestled against Henry Dexter last night. He was in Corpus Christi, Texas. In a hotel. The Marriot. He had driven here from Austin. It was Sunday.

Now Fran Wallace was calling him. Fran Wallace, she was…Duke’s assistant. Joey had spoken to her before. He was supposed to do another house show tonight. Houston was Monday, but it was the big show, and he was in the main event. He would have to do publicity. He should have expected it.

He took a big breath and slowly exhaled. Everything was fine. He picked up the phone.

“Hi Fran, sorry, I just had to get my bearings.”

“Well that’s perfectly understandable. I’m so sorry I woke you up.” She had a heavy New York accent. Joey could picture her now. She was short and skinny, with straight brown hair that went all the way down her back. She wore business suits.

“Would you like me to start over Joey?”

“No, I’ve got it. Be in the lobby, ready to go, in an hour.”

“That’s right. Gunther Olson will be waiting for you when you arrive in Houston. He’ll take care of you.”

Damn it was cold. The air conditioner was blasting like only a hotel unit could.

“I’m scheduled to wrestle tonight,” Joey said, hoping that Fran would say his match was canceled. His back was still hurting from Crusader and Jumbo’s pounding last Monday. There was ibuprofen in the bathroom. He’d be popping a handful as soon as he got off the phone.

“Don’t worry about tonight Joey. We’ve got you covered. Don’t worry about anything. You’ll learn that I take good care of my wrestlers out on assignment. Gunther will take you back to the Houston airport this afternoon in plenty of time for you to catch a flight back to Corpus for your show. Be sure to pack everything you’ll need.”

Great. Two flights, publicity appearances, and he still had to do the show tonight. This was going to be an awful day.

“Alright. So I guess Gunther will tell me what I need to know once I get there.”

“Right again Joey. You just show up in the lobby in an hour. We’ll take care of you from there.”

“Okay. Thanks Fran. I guess I’d better get moving.”

“Have a good day Joey.”

An hour later he was in the Corpus Christi airport, where he boarded a jet to Houston. He still hadn’t heard anything about the booking in his match on Monday night, and was starting to get nervous. He had hoped to spend the weekend memorizing his spots.

As promised, Gunther Olson, a stocky former wrestler turned GWA gopher, was waiting at the airport. Upon seeing Joey, he took off his baseball cap and waved it over his head. He looked like a fool.

“Welcome to Houston, Joey,” he said.

They shook hands. Gunther’s palm was sticky. They exchanged pleasantries, then Joey asked if Gunther knew anything about Monday’s booking.

“What makes you think Monday’s even booked yet?” Gunther said. “This is Duke we’re talking about, right?”

Gunther laughed at his own joke. Joey forced a smile. Duke was known for last-minute changes and booking on the fly. He often made crucial booking decisions as he spoke with the wrestlers minutes before showtime. Joey had hoped Monday night’s match would be different. There was enough pressure on him already. He didn’t want to improvise his first title match.

“Can you press on Duke for info?” Joey asked. “Maybe if we push him he’ll get the booking done early.”

“I’ll do my best,” said Gunther.

Their first stop was a radio station, where Joey answered phone-in questions from fans for an hour, then recorded an interview to be aired later that day on a nationally syndicated rock and wrestling show. From there, Gunther carted Joey to a television studio to shoot a 10-second promotional clip for Monday Night’s Burn. Still in television makeup, Joey’s next appearance was at a bookstore, where he did an autograph signing and an interview for another local TV station. The afternoon came and went without any word from Duke. While Joey was signing autographs, Gunther called Duke’s cell phone, his office, and his home, leaving messages at each.

“Let’s leave messages for all the VPs and all the road agents. Someone has to know where he is,” Joey said to Gunther while scribbling his name on the back of a girl’s T-shirt.

“You don’t make it far in this business by pestering the boss,” said Gunther. “We’ve left three messages. That’s enough. Nothing more we can do.”

The autograph session ended at two, and Gunther rushed Joey into the car for their final stop, an Internet media firm who wished to tape an interview with Joey for a webcast the next day. They were completely disorganized and after ten minutes Gunther announced that it was taking too long and canceled the session.

As they were driving back to Houston Intercontinental, Gunther’s phone rang. Joey sat up.

“Gunther speaking…..Hi Honey Bear.”

Gunther spoke with his wife for the rest of the drive, stopping the conversation only to shake Joey’s hand before dropping him off at the airport.

By the time Joey landed in Corpus Christi, there was only an hour left before the show started. No one was at the airport to pick him up. So much for Fran’s promise that he would be taken care of.

It took him fifteen minutes to get a taxi at the tiny airport, and another twenty to get to the arena.

Martha Tanner greeted Joey backstage.

“We didn’t know if you were gonna make it, kid. You should have called. Do you have my phone number?”

“I was doing publicity in Houston.”

“Well it would have been nice if someone had told someone. No one knew where you were. You know you’re in the main event tonight, don’t you?”

“No. I didn’t know that. Am I wrestling Goliath?”

“No, he’s not here tonight. You’re going over Gordy Goodnow. You should find him. I bet he wants to talk to you about the match.”

“Thanks Martha.”

Joey took his bag to the locker room to change into his wrestling attire. To his disappointment, none of the other wrestlers confronted him about being late, so he didn’t have an opportunity to tell his sap story of plane trips and publicity sessions.

Joey and Gordy Goodnow worked out a simple match with Joey going over. They performed their makeshift script without any problems. The match was one that both of them, and a thousand other wrestlers, had done countless times in countless cities. Corpus Christi ate it up.

* * * * *

Joey woke up the next morning at eleven. He panicked when he saw the time. Less than twelve hours until his World Title Match. He still hadn’t heard from Duke. No call from Fran either. As far as he knew, he had no way of getting to Houston. What a shitty job she had done as his travel coordinator.

After checking out of the hotel, Joey took the hotel’s shuttle service to the airport, where he caught the next flight to Houston. From the airport he took a cab to the Astrodome.

On the way, he thought back to when he was a teenager, and had watched Red Jackson defeat Shane Walker for the GWA Title at Myers Arena in Memphis. Joey remembered the wrestlers seeming distant, mysterious. They weren’t human. They were characters from television, larger in stature than any regular man could be.

Joey had never considered that Red Jackson or Shane Walker might have been nervous that night. From his vantage as a fan, the performers were incapable of human weaknesses like fear. But now he wondered. Did they go out there and improvise their match, as Joey and Goliath were now likely to do? Was Shane Walker worried that he might find himself half-way through the match, out of ideas, throwing his opponent into a chinlock and killing the crowd? Did Red Jackson wonder if he had what it took to be the number one guy? Did either of them have to deal with backstage politics?

A security guard let Joey inside the stadium. The crew was running sound checks and testing the ring ropes. No one had seen Duke yet.

The other wrestlers began arriving at four o’clock. One of the first to come backstage was Jade. Joey was relieved to see her.

“Hey stranger,” she said. “How did the Corpus Christi show turn out?”

“It was fine. Crowd dug it. I had fun.”

“And the night before that was…”

“Austin. It was good too. Did you enjoy your time off?”

“Oh yeah. It’s so rare to get a Saturday and Sunday in a row. My sister and I went shopping and to the movies and out to dinner. It was sweet.”

Joey smiled and nodded. “Listen, you haven’t seen Duke or Goliath around have you?”

“No, but I just got here. I suppose you want to talk to them about your big match tonight. Still nervous?”

“Yes. And I have no idea what we’re doing.”

“Don’t sweat it. You’ll be great, and I’ll be rooting for you,” Jade said. “I’m going to go get dressed and do some stretching. I’m on early tonight.”

“Good luck. I’ll see you later?”

“Sure. Find me after the show.”

For the next hour, Joey paced the hallways of the backstage area. At six, one hour before showtime, Duke and Goliath appeared. Duke was speaking on his cell phone, and he looked frazzled.

Joey pushed through a group of crew members to get to Duke and Goliath right as they stepped backstage. Goliath smiled at Joey and shook his hand. Duke ignored Joey and continued down the hall, speaking furiously into his cell phone.

“We’ve had an issue brewing all weekend that doesn’t look good for us,” Goliath said, almost in a whisper.

“What is it?” said Joey.

They now were walking through the hall toward the performers’ entrance. Right behind the entrance sat the control table, where Duke was stationed during the live shows, able to speak to the commentators and the referees through their headsets.

“Crusader’s jumped ship,” said Goliath.

“Really, he’s already gone?” asked Joey, trying to hide his joy at the news.

“Yes. Apparently he’s going to show up on Riot tonight. Duke’s been on the horn with the lawyers all weekend. From the sounds of it, I don’t think he can stop it.”

Joey felt like the bully was absent from school. But then he wondered if the locker room would blame him for sending Crusader away. He could hear Crusader, with his ridiculous Canadian accent, telling the guys that having to do the job to Joey was the last straw.

“Nothing. We’ve got nothing. Those god-damned bastards,” said Duke, snapping his cell phone shut. “I can’t fucking believe this.”

They arrived at the control table, which was still being set up by two crew members. Shane Walker was sitting against the wall behind the table, speaking to Monty Monroe, another GWA agent. Shane nodded his head to acknowledge Joey.

“Eight years I’ve worked with Scott,” Duke said to no one in particular. “All he had to do was ask and I would have let him go. That asshole’s gonna pay for this.”

“They’re not going to know what to do with him,” said Goliath.

“Damn right they’re not,” said Duke. “Asshole would be cleaning toilets if it weren’t for me. He got pushed because I thought he was loyal. Serves me right I guess.”

“Gentlemen, we have a problem,” Duke said to Shane and Monty.

“Come on, we’ll catch up with Duke later,” Goliath said to Joey. Without waiting for Joey to respond, Goliath started walking toward the locker rooms. Joey hesitated. He looked at Duke. All weekend he had wanted to speak with him. Now he was here. But it wasn’t the right time. Joey followed Goliath.

“Do you know what we’re going to do in our match tonight?” Joey asked.

“I’ve got it worked out. Duke might go over some specifics with us later. You’re going to get the upper hand, you’re going to beat the squat out of me, the ref’s going to take a bump, you’re going to pin me with no one there to count. With the ref still out, I’ll come to and cheat, I might start with a low blow. By the time the ref’s up, I’m going to hit you with the title belt and you’ll be easy to pin.”

“Okay,” Joey said.

Duke might go over specifics later? So this was it. There would be no script from Duke. Goliath had just laid out the standard match for a main event with a heel going over. Getting from spot to spot within that layout would be up to Joey and Goliath in the ring.

“I’m going to go stake out a quiet place in the back somewhere,” said Goliath. “I’ll see you in a bit whenever Duke’s ready to talk to us.”

“Alright. See you later,” said Joey. He didn’t want to separate. He wanted to cling to Goliath or Duke until the match, to force them to tell him everything they knew. But it was common practice, practically tradition, that Goliath would disappear in the backstage area for an hour or so before his showtime. The official story, the one told to journalists and rookies and snoops backstage, was that Goliath needed private time to focus. After all, Goliath’s intensity and focus in the ring, especially on TV and pay per views, was unmatched. That intensity carried out of the ring too. After his matches, Goliath might throw violent temper tantrums and pick fights with the boys backstage. These sorts of incidents had to be covered up to protect the official story, lest the truth escape. The truth was that Goliath was one of a handful of wrestlers who disappeared before showtime to jack up with the latest concoctions that beat the official drug tests, a practice that Duke and everyone else in the company pretended not to know about. The laid-back demeanor that greeted Joey tonight would be gone when Goliath returned. In its place would be a chemically-enhanced wrestling beast.

Joey took a seat in front of one of the many televisions backstage and the show started. Duke sat at the control table and actively spoke into his headset during every match and TV segment. It was apparent that he wouldn’t be speaking to Joey at all tonight.

For the next hour and forty-five minutes, the TV announcers hyped Joey’s match like the Super Bowl. They talked about it during every segment, ignoring whatever was going on in the ring at the time to promote the night’s main event. Clips of Joey winning the tournament were shown before every commercial break. A promotional video package of Goliath training in a gym to heavy metal music aired twice. At the start of the show’s second hour, the announcers began a countdown until the World Title Match, periodically announcing the number of minutes left until the match began.

At 9:30, fifteen minutes before their curtain time, Goliath re-appeared from exile. His pupils were dilated, and his face was intense. He slapped Joey on the back as he walked past him.

“Joey, let’s get you in place for your entrance,” said Martha. Joey followed her out of the locker room area toward the black curtain.

* * * * *

Joey’s entrance was first. He stood behind the curtain, listening to Melissa Marcus, the ring announcer, “The following match is scheduled for one fall and is for the GWA World Heavyweight Championship!”

“Okay Joey, you’re on,” said a stagehand. Joey’s music started, and he stepped into the wrestling world.

“Introducing first, weighing in at two hundred thirty pounds, Joey Mayhem!”

Thirty-thousand people filled the Astrodome from the floor to the ceiling, and they were all his fans. Signs bearing Joey’s name floated atop the sea of hands. Joey’s hard rock music blared throughout the stadium. As he walked down the aisle, he could hear the shouts of the fans closest to him.

“Alright Joey!”

“Kick his ass tonight!”

Joey stepped into the ring, then worked the corners. At each ringpost, the crowd responded to him like he was some sort of deity. Hundreds of flashbulbs popped in the darkness. As Joey took it all in, he felt a shudder of fear that one day soon it all would end, and these same people who adored him now would grow to hate him, or worse, become indifferent.

“And introducing the champion, weighing in at three hundred pounds, Goliath!”

The arena lights dimmed, and Goliath’s rhythmic heavy metal music started. The twenty foot TV screen above the entrance glowed bright orange with Goliath’s black logo in the center. Goliath stepped into the arena, and his fiery orange pyrotechnics exploded around him. The crowd cheered for his impressive entrance.

Goliath stepped into the ring as the arena lights returned and his music faded. He handed his title belt to Nick Gaugin, the referee, who held it over his head and turned to display it to the entire audience. Nick walked to the edge of the ring, handed the belt to the timekeeper, and called for the bell, starting the match.

The crowd was already in a frenzy of anticipation. Joey sensed that these people expected the world from him tonight, and suddenly he felt naked.

He stepped forward for the first lock-up with Goliath. On Goliath’s cue, they snapped into a wrestling hold, Joey’s left hand on Goliath’s right shoulder, his right hand grabbing onto Goliath’s mane of blonde hair. Goliath won the lock-up and threw Joey to the floor.

Joey stood up slowly, keeping his eyes locked on Goliath’s face. The two men circled the ring, staring each other down. The crowd remained hot. Goliath charged and they locked up again. This lock-up had a little more action. Joey instantly fell to one knee, but was able to get up, regain his balance, and push Goliath into a corner, where Nick stepped in and broke the hold. Obeying the ref, Goliath lifted his hands in the air, playing innocent, but as soon as Nick stepped out of the way, Goliath planted a knee right in Joey’s abdomen. The crowd booed. Joey groaned and doubled over, allowing Goliath to knock him down and pummel him with fists and kicks.

Joey curled up in a protective stance and Nick pulled Goliath off of him. Goliath stepped to the middle of the ring and held up his hands to pander to the crowd, who were only too happy to boo and hiss. As Joey lay on the floor, doing his best to writhe in agony, he listened to the crowd’s venom. The heat for this match was blistering. Everyone in the Astrodome wanted Joey to win.

He stumbled to his feet only to see Goliath charging at him with a vicious clothesline that sent him right back to the floor. Again, Goliath stepped away and pandered to the crowd.

Joey crawled back up and staggered toward Goliath. As the babyface in peril, Joey would allow Goliath to beat him senseless until Goliath called a new spot. GWA matches usually played out as such. The heel would gain the upper hand and dominate the match until the crowd just couldn’t bear it. The babyface wouldn’t get in any real offense until the very end of the match, at which point the announcers could point out his stamina and heart.

After two more minutes of general pummeling, Goliath called for a more active spot. “Bulldog from the corner,” he whispered to Joey before swinging him into the ringpost. An instant after Joey’s back hit the turnbuckles, Goliath splashed right into him, then grabbed the back of his head and pulled him to the ground in a well-executed bulldog. Goliath rolled Joey over and covered him.

“One more near-fall after this,” Goliath whispered.

Nick swept to the floor and pounded out one..two.. then Joey used his feet to kick out of the cover.

Acting frustrated, Goliath grabbed Joey’s hair and pulled him to his feet, only to deliver a hard punch to the face that sent Joey right back to the floor. Goliath lifted Joey again and whipped him off the ropes into a clothesline. Then he went for another cover.

One..two.. Joey kicked out again.

The crowd was pleased that Joey was kicking out of the near-falls. Even though it appeared that Goliath was dominating the fight and was near a victory, the crowd knew well where this match was going. For the most seasoned fans, the fact that Goliath was in complete control of the match in the early-going was all the more reason to believe that Joey Mayhem would be the victor when the night was over.

Again, Goliath used Joey’s hair to raise him from the mat.

“Ref bump, then you hit a superkick,” Goliath whispered.

Joey looked to Nick to see if he was ready to take the obligatory “ref bump.” Nick nodded his head once. Joey allowed Goliath to swing him into an irish whip. Goliath followed through and swung Joey toward the corner. On the way, Joey caught Nick and sandwiched him into the ringpost. As Joey reeled out of the corner, Goliath charged at him to deliver another clothesline. Right as Goliath swung, Joey ducked out of the way, and Goliath walloped Nick, who fell back in a blur of stripes. Nick landed on his back, rolled over to his stomach, and lay still as if unconscious. Goliath hesitated in surprise. Joey collected himself to prepare for the big kick that would switch the momentum of the match. Goliath turned around and Joey stepped forward to deliver a high kick right to his chin.

The kick connected.

Goliath snapped to the mat with the impact, making a loud slap as he fell. The crowd went crazy. Joey stumbled and fell on top of Goliath for the cover. Of course, with Nick face-first on the mat, there was no referee to make the count

The crowd knew their job here, and counted in the referee’s absence. “One…two…three…four….five….six…” they yelled.

“Wesley Bunt,” Joey whispered, signaling a classic wrestling spot. Wesley Bunt was a GWA wrestler in the 80s who became famous for losing his matches due to distraction. Whether it was a manager, another wrestler, a valet, or the fans, Wesley always paid attention to something other than his opponent and got walloped when he wasn’t looking. Hence, in the GWA, if you wanted to have a spot where your opponent hit you from behind while something else distracted you, you called for a Wesley Bunt.

Joey rolled off Goliath and walked to the corner of the ring where Nick was laid out. Leaning down, he shook the referee as if trying to wake him. As he did this, Joey braced himself for a kick to the back of the head.

He continued shaking Nick.

“Wake up,” Joey said aloud for effect. “Come on.”

Nick lay still, as he was supposed to. A cardinal rule of refereeing was to remain unconscious if the babyface was in a position to win.

“Wake up ref,” Joey said, frustrated that Goliath was taking so long.

The crowd was growing quiet. Joey was getting angry. In professional wrestling, a few seconds of downtime could ruin an entire match.

“What’s taking so long?” Nick said discreetly.

Joey chose not to respond, since the television camera was pointed right at his face. He turned around. Goliath was still down on the mat with his eyes closed, unmoved from where he had landed. He was too experienced to miss a spot. He must have knocked himself unconscious when he fell to the mat, Joey thought. Now, with thirty thousand fans in the arena, and another million watching on television, Joey was going to have to fake his way through this mess until Goliath woke up to finish the match.

Joey looked around to assess the situation. Goliath was down in the middle of the ring. Nick had wisely chosen to remain strewn out in the corner. Nick wore an earpiece through which Duke could speak to him while the match was in progress. No doubt Duke would keep the ref down until Goliath got up. It was Joey’s job to figure out how to entertain the fans and keep the match going until that happened.

And suddenly it was all familiar. He had been here before. His second professional match ever, in his hometown, against Oscar Esquivel, with his whole world watching. He had messed up a superkick and knocked out Oscar’s front teeth. It was the worst mistake of his career, and now he had done it again, only this time he had left his opponent out cold.

And this time it was on national television, for the World Title.

No, he couldn’t have done it again. He’d mastered the move since then, probably better than anyone else in the business. He knew what a well-executed superkick felt like. Just light contact after your leg is fully extended. He had done it hundreds of times. Tonight was no different. And he would never forget that jolt of face-smashing inertia that came after the botched kick. It wasn’t there tonight. The kick was fine. Goliath had taken the bump wrong.

Stay in character, Joey told himself. What would Joey Mayhem do if this were all for real? Joey Mayhem wants to win the World Title. His opponent is unconscious on his back in the ring. All Joey needs is a referee to count to three.

Joey stepped under the ropes and walked to the ring announcer’s table. He grabbed a microphone and rolled back into the ring. Putting one foot on Goliath’s chest (a legal cover for a pinfall) Joey said into the microphone, “Can we get another referee out here?”

The crowd went nuts. They loved this sort of chaos. As they began their own pinfall count again, “One…two….three….four…” Joey thought to himself that this wasn’t turning out all bad. The crowd was very much into it, and they were still on the side of the babyface. Joey had done his part, Duke would send out a new referee to make this look like it all might have been planned. Maybe Goliath would wake up. If not, Joey was scheduled to win the belt down the road anyway. Everyone would understand. Beneath his foot, Joey could feel Goliath’s chest moving up and down. If Goliath could just pull himself together, this all would turn out fine.

“Seven…eight….nine…” the crowd continued to chant. And then Dr. Ernie Trott, a long-time GWA physician, came out from behind the curtain and ran to the ring. The crowd popped for his entrance like he was a wrestling superstar. Dr. Trott slid into the ring and waived his arms at Joey, asking him to get off Goliath. The crowd booed. Dr. Trott knelt down next to Goliath, and took his pulse off his neck. As he did so, the crowd’s boos faded to silence as they realized the injury might be real.

A hand touched Joey’s left shoulder from behind. It was Nick. He was standing, and out of character.

“Let’s get out of the ring,” said Nick.

No, Joey wanted to say. No, he’s going to be alright. This is a terrible idea; the match will be ruined. The stupid lug just took a bad bump. Maybe if he weren’t so drugged up he’d be more careful.

But still aware of the TV cameras all around him, Joey said nothing, and followed Nick through the ropes and to the timekeeper’s table, where steel chairs for skull-bashing were always kept. Nick and Joey each unfolded a chair and sat.

In the ring, Dr. Trott was holding smelling salts beneath Goliath’s nose. Goliath’s eyes opened, and he tried to sit up, only to fall back again.

The crowd remained quiet. In recent years, professional wrestling had blurred the line between real injuries and fake ones, making it difficult for fans to determine if they were being worked or not.

The television audience went to commercial. When they came back, they saw a team of paramedics sliding a straight board under Goliath, and, on a 3-count, lifting and carrying him out of the ring. They gently slid him under the bottom rope and onto a stretcher. With cameramen following, the paramedics rolled the stretcher out of the arena, through the backstage area, and onto an ambulance. The crowd applauded as Goliath was rolled out. The television announcers spoke in hushed tones to the home audience, using platitudes like, “This is bigger than the show. We all hope Goliath is okay. He and his family will be in our prayers.”

For the fans watching at home, the last shot of the night was the ambulance driving into the darkness.

“Okay Joey, we’re off the air,” said Nick, holding his hand over his earpiece. “They’re going to play your music. Make a quick exit.”